Aleiya is a design justice facilitator, strategist, and researcher. She is passionate about engaging the radical imagination to create the conditions for liberation and abundance, and believes that design can be a tool for healing.

Favorite Black space: The Trailblazers program that I am a part of here in Denver through Women's Wilderness. It has been beautiful to reconnect with nature in a community of amazing Black women.

Alicia works with community development corporations, private developers, and non-profits to create visions of spaces that reflect their mission and goals for positive change.

Favorite Black space: My favorite Black space is any place my family reunions take place. So much of my family's legacy shines through during these times together.

Aly is a curious-minded dot connector working to create meaningful impact on systems and products through empathetic, user-centered design. Aly is passionate about people, cities, and social justice and has a Master’s degree in Urban Planning.

Favorite Black space: Afropunk is one of my favorite Black spaces, even though its ephemeral. The sheer number of Black folks that come together from so many places and spaces and background to create a sort of utopia never fails to blow my mind.

Amanda has worked for over 10 years in the community development sector, on issues ranging from public infrastructure to environmental justice to affordable housing. She is an urban geographer motivated by the idea of building vibrant communities for all.

Favorite Black space: Paul Robeson House — just a few blocks from my home in Philly, stands a wonderfully preserved building and community space that was the last home of Paul Robeson. The space hosts community and private events and has a historical marker outside, acknowledging his legacy. When I get off the bus with my daughter most weekdays after school, it's a gentle reminder of the way the Black Radical Tradition is woven literally into the fabric of our communities.

April is an Apostolic, Bronx native educator and planner. She works at the intersection of neighborhood planning, environmental justice, and policy. Increasing the agency of Black and immigrant New Yorkers is a primary goal in all her work.

Favorite Black space: Drew Community Garden, the Bronx river runs through the garden. It's a place to rest, grow food, elders from every culture gather to share their food, their knowledge and their work :-).

Armando is an equity-centered transit planner and geographer focused on empowering communities through mobility and spatial analysis. He is from Montgomery County, MD and earned his Masters in Urban Planning from Harvard University. He currently lives in Hyde Park, Chicago.

Favorite Black space: My family's compound in Viriginia where my grandmother and two uncles each have a house. This is where all graduation parties, cookouts, birthday parties, and holiday celebrations take place.

Britt Redd is the Interim Executive Director of the Indianapolis Neighborhood Resource Center and Founder of Ubuntu Planning Studio. Britt teaches at Ball State University and is pursuing an Executive Master’s in Nonprofit Administration at Notre Dame.

Favorite Black space: With my friends and family around the dinner table.

Cara Michell is an artist and Professor. Previously, she was an urban planner in NYC and Toronto. Her community-led cartography has been featured at MoMA PS1, La Mama Galleria, the New Museum, and Creative Time. In 2015, she co-founded and co-chaired the Black in Design conference.

Favorite Black space: Tompkins Ave on Sundays because I can go there and be surrounded by the music, joy, and people of Black Brooklyn. It brings me back to summer afternoons on my great-grandmother's Bed-Stuy stoop.

Chandra is an urban planner, advocate and artist. A background in community development and environmental justice informs her design approach of working with stakeholders in a participatory process to support capacity building, achieve place-based solutions & reimagine systems.

Favorite Black space: 31st St Beach because of the vibrant energy, deep laughter and joyful music.

Charlemya Erasme is a Haitian-American who cares deeply about systems-level change and alleviating suffering. Building on her Biology and STEM Education background, Charlemya is dedicated to learning, research, and racial justice.

Favorite Black space: Wherever Black people are on the internet – Black people are trendsetters and thought leaders. It's a place where I experience so much digital joy.

Charlie Redd is a sound healer and wellness teacher. At the core of everything that she does is a passion a mission to create spaces where people from marginalized groups can show up as their whole selves.

Chloé is the founder of Sowing Love, where she helps communities to organize around love to manifest community solutions rooted in care and belonging. She lives in NYC with her husband and can often be found reading a book that her Daddy says is always about “the struggle of…”

Favorite Black space: Everytime I’m in Oakland for work I hit up Kinfolx. It’s a Black-owned coffee shop, wine bar, and community space. You can feel the love when you cross the threshold. Love being enveloped in their jazziness, they make an incredible chai (gotta try it with their Kinfolx syrup!), and they truly care about community.

As a woman of indigenous descent and an educator of over 20 years, stewardship principles are central to Chopp’s practice – ethically honoring both space and the vibrant vision of her clients, the work of Florida Water Interiors is an offering to the land, sacred space.

Favorite Black space: My Aunty Lydia's home. I grew up with my Aunty having a show on PBS called the Black family. In later years she became the curator of the historic Black museum in the historic Black theatre that my other Aunty was the director of. This museum was located in the hisotric Black neighborhood that my enslaved great great grandfather, who died as a freed land developer, built. My Aunty Lydia's home reflected all of that good Blackness she was and still is. Her home holds so much grace, style and story...the antique bohmeian classicness is dripping off the walls hunney!

Cinthia has over 15 years of community engagement experience. She holds a bachelor’s in Human Biology and MPH in Social Behaviors and Community Health from the University at Albany, a certificate in management from Hunter College, and a MUP from New York University.

Favorite Black space: One of my favorite Black spaces is my running crew since its a space occupied by majority people of color and everyone is treated like an equal regardless of your running accomplishments or aspirations. I love how we get to practice community; no one gets left behind.

Courtney Morgan is an artist, storyteller, place keeper, urban designer, and environmental advocate of Jamaican descent, who’s work redistributes power by using design as a social practice.

Favorite Black space: BlackSpace creates accessible tools for communities and designers to co-create together. The inclusion of multiple narratives and experiences makes BlackSpace feel like a community I want to be a part of.

Dalaeja Foreman is a world-builder, martial artist, curator, wood-worker and first-generation Caribbean-New Yorker. She is one of three founders of the woodworking cooperative, breadfruit. As well as the founder/owner of a mobile martial arts school named Metamorphosis Movement.

Favorite Black space: The beauty supply store, because for the small price of a wig cap, there is always a fun wig to try on.

Danielle is an economist, specializing in U.S. labor market trends and inequality. Her prior work and research centers on community economic development, gentrification, and housing. Danielle’s mission is to use her skills to improve marginalized people’s economic outcomes.

Favorite Black space: My favorite BlackSpace is my Bronx neighborhood. It has all my favorite food, people, and memories — it's where I feel most at home.

Daphne is an urban planner, policymaker, and artist. She is a Public Scholar at The Moynihan Center at City College where her work explores the intersections between science fiction and city planning. Previously she worked on climate policy and land use projects for New York City.

Favorite Black space: Currently it's Shirley Chisholm Park. It's a beautiful state park that feels like a Black space because it's surrounded by Black communities in southeast Brooklyn. When you enter the park you're greeted by a beautiful mural of Shirley Chisholm. I love seeing Black people outdoors walking, biking, BBQ-ing, fishing, and being joyful in public space.

Dariella is a Brooklyn-based R&B enthusiast with a decade of experience in Human Services. Her passion lies in uncovering untold narratives of the past, finding lessons in the present, and envisioning a transformative future for herself and the Black collective.

Favorite Black space: My favorite Black space is the feeling of love you get when a Black elder in your community is light-weight fussing at you.

Devon manages the programs and outreach efforts at the historic Madam Walker Legacy Center. As a freelance artist and meditation practitioner, Ginn’s practice examines the psychogeographies of the built environment through the lens of defiant joy and mindfulness.

Favorite Black space: The Indianapolis Public Library's Center for Black Literature and Culture elevates the artistic, academic, and social contributions of Black people from across the African diaspora. It is one of my favorite spots to study and chill.

Diane is a cultural change maker and marketing strategist based in North Carolina. She dedicates herself to projects that integrate academia and arts, aiming to advance racial economic justice and enhance the well-being of marginalized communities.

Favorite Black space: Black August in the Park is a festival in Durham, NC that centers “US.” It is a curated safe space that amplifies Black joy and excellence.

Dominique is a storyteller and event host from Anchorage, Alaska, living in Brooklyn, New York. Growing up as a military kid, traveling helped her find her voice through meeting new people and cultures. This led her to focus on the intersections that make us all so different but beautiful.

Favorite Black space: The moment at 2:45am at a party where we switch from She Gotta Donk to Kirk Franklin. I feel like my spirit just elevates. All the parts of me intersect fully, and I can see it reflected back with my friends. It's love, it's community.

Emma Osore is a Brooklyn-based community designer, BlackSpace founder & its Co-Managing Director. Prior, she led first-of-its-kind initiatives at NEW INC, Americans f/t Arts, City of Beverly Hills & DC Public Schools to establish communities that re-shape public policy & practice.

Favorite Black space: Prince Georges County, MD - it's where I'm from and I love the unique cultural, intellectual, and economic contributions we make to the national Black experience.

Jeremiah is a Nigerian-American artist, educator & entrepreneur, who combines urban design, photography, sculpture, and social engagement. His artistic and consulting work explore Black cultural heritage in the context of power dynamics within spatial, social & economic (in)justice.

Favorite Black space: The stoop, front porch, steps outside of any Black home is the most honest and fun filled place on earth!

Julia is a culturally-informed community planner working towards an equitable, sustainable future by centering minoritized experiences in governance, planning, & development processes.

Favorite Black space: Community events that bring the community together around a common interest are inspiring and sacred for me (block parties, markets, festivals, educational discussions, etc.)

Justin is a planning and engineering professional working to use data to help make the ways we plan for mobility more equitable, accessible, and effective.

Favorite Black space: St. Rest No 2 (on 87th St in Chicago) because of the friendliness, the food and the longevity.

Kenyatta is interested in neighborhood resource distribution and heritage conservation. She previously worked on commercial corridor health with the NYC government. She studied Political Science and Afro-American Studies at UCLA and earned her Master’s in City Planning at MIT.

Favorite Black space: I love a good beauty supply, I love to switch up my hair so it's like my own arts and crafts store. Each store has their own flare and its fun to strike up convos with other shoppers about what they are doing to their hair.

As an urbanist and storyteller, Kyra is passionate about co-creating safe spaces of expression and cultural activations. Her focus is on extolling marginalized Black, Indigenous, and Afro-Latino voices as a point of activism against the white lens and space no matter where she lives.

Favorite Black space: My bed because it's warm and safe.

LaTasha has been supporting non profits and social organizations for over 20 years. She has consulted for organizations like Work Ready Oklahoma, CHUMS OKC, and NEOKC Renaissance. In 2019, she founded Lillian Timber Farms, a non profit urban farm in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.

Favorite Black space: The garden! The colorfulness and richness of the garden reminds me of the fullness of Black People and Black Culture.

Lorryn is a Chicago-based litigation attorney. Lorryn is dedicated to fostering community pride, utilizing the law to create new opportunities, and protecting the legacies of individuals and businesses to ensure our communities thrive.

Favorite Black space: DuSable Museum of African-American History

Melissa Lee is an urban planner, community organizer, and reformed public servant, steeped in the certainty that anything is possible when radical imagination pairs with action. Throughout her professional journey, she has brought this certainty as Principal at Public Works Partners.

Favorite Black space: The median in New Orleans, or they space they refer to as the "neutral ground." Now as a part of the nomenclature applied to any such median, the neutral ground is a prominent player in a life well lived in New Orleans. Neutral grounds play a prominent role in the history, culture and most importantly it is the space where common purpose, energy and passion among people are nurtured.

Michele Y. Washington is a transdisciplinary designer, researcher, writer, and academic. Her projects span civic design, cultural spaces, curatorial, non-profit, publishing, and archival collections. Currently, she works for Coforma, in Civic Design.

Favorite Black space: Freedom and Humanity

Peter is the founder of WorkUrban, a design consultancy that partners with communities, individuals and institutions while engaging students on a pathway toward leadership and empowerment through community engagement and participatory design.

Favorite Black space: Janet's, a Jamaican restaurant in a private house in Queens, NY

RaShaunda is a culturally centered educator of reproductive health and well-being. She is a Multi-Certified Community-Based Practitioner whose expertise brings a conscious focus to intercept common challenges associated with underrepresented urban childbearing communities.

Favorite Black space: My favorite Black space is Kindred Spirits. It's a local community space for Black professionals and community members that centers urban culture and entertainment in NE OKC.

Ravon Ruffin Feliz (Ray-ven) is an anthropologist, artist, and community designer based in the Bronx. she is the co-founder of Citation Studio, an experimental thinking studio imagining new possibilities with/on/for/at the internet.

Favorite Black space: I love the living room as a historically Black space. I have fond memories of it serving many functions — hair salon, hub for exchanging news (and gossip), entertainment space (lifetime was always on), overflow from the kitchen and dining room on holidays.

Sabea is a coordinator and facilitator grounded by collaborative projects that amplify the interests and innovations of Black and Indigenous people. She studied Linguistics, Religion, and Africana Studies at Haverford and Bryn Mawr Colleges, where they’ve also been an instructor and program manager in Africana Studies and Education.

Favorite Black space: Anywhere I can have boiled yam, dumpling, and banana for breakfast.

Saradine is a senior project manager at NYCEDC. She is interested in how the public realm can be used to empower marginalized communities. She is passionate about equity and justice in public planning processes and prioritizes community engagement in all projects she takes part in.

Favorite Black space: Flatbush in Brooklyn! I especially love visiting the Haitian restaurants and bakeries. When I'm feeling homesick these spaces provide some much needed comfort.

Sarah is a multidisciplinary designer, design strategist and storyteller interested in engaging social equity through design. She’s passionate about community-centered design and strives to promote agency and collaboration throughout the design process.

Favorite Black space: Kenya - its where I am from, it’s my ancestral home.

Sumayyah Súnmádé Raji is a Nigerian designer, researcher, and storyteller that reimagines cities through the lens of community and cultural narratives.

Favorite Black space: Childhood Home

Tiffany-Ann Taylor is the Vice President for Transportation at the Regional Plan Association. Prior to working at RPA, Tiffany worked in public service on transformative urban and suburban transportation projects for freight and passenger mobility.

Favorite Black space: Beauty supply stores. Although not often explicitly black spaces, finding familiar beauty products, hair care products and make up is affirming. It means a lot to find products that make you feel beautiful when we often exist in places that constantly tell us we are not.

Favorite Black space: My favorite Black space is the hair salon because it's where I can be in sisterhood, be supported, and leave looking and feeling better!